I tried a Claude Code rival that's local, open source, and completely free - how it went

The article walks through installing and configuring Ollama and the Qwen3-coder:30b model with the Goose agent framework to build a free, fully local coding assistant, covering model selection, exposing Ollama to the network, and linking Goose to Ollama; initial tests on a high-spec Mac showed solid performance but required multiple retries to complete a simple WordPress plugin, indicating accuracy and iteration challenges, with deeper evaluations planned in follow-up pieces.